Thursday, December 30, 2010

Just the other day I was saying to Bren that I felt so uninspired in the sewing department. I've been knitting like crazy, but I didn't remember the last time I had reached into my vintage sheet pile or made something just because.

This morning we drove to Melbourne to do the egg drop offs because our delivery guy is on holidays. Afterwards we popped into a shopping centre for some retail action. The girls each had a list of a few basics that they needed and I was happy to get all the shopping done in one go.

Well I have no idea if its me or the current fashion, but we didn't find anything except shoes. It seems I have lots of family fashion don'ts these days. I don't like branded clothes, clothes with characters on them, slogan clothes, shiny clothes, too tight clothes, slutty clothes, clothes I can make easily, fluorescent clothes, fussy clothes, clothes with tacky machine embroidery, white clothes...gosh, somebody stop me now.

Anyhow, we came home from Melbourne, Bren went out to mow, the girls started some sort of game and I pulled out an old sheet and drew a pattern onto it and sewed a dress. A simple, girly, cotton, comfy, light, summery dress.

She loves it. The big girls do too.

I've drawn a pattern off it to make some more in other colours and patterns.

It looks like it passes the running away from Mum and her annoying photo shoots too.

So my sewing inspiration might have come out of hibernation after all. Yay!

I'm off now to pack our emergency fire kits. If its not pouring with rain here, it seems its HOT with wild winds.

So how about you? Have you had any luck shopping for kids' clothes lately? Do you have crazy clothing rules like me? Do shopping excursions make you dash for your machine too? Have you got plans for New Years' Eve? How would you dress up your bike if you had to? What are you having for dinner tonight?

Sunday, December 26, 2010

At our house today we are all tired and slow after being up most of last night watching Willow the Maremma give birth to her six puppies, three girls and three boys.

It was such an incredible and emotional and humbling part of life to witness.

Willow has been napping on and off all day while her still closed eyes pups guzzle hungrily at her teats. She is such a great mama, so attentive and patient and adoring. And we have all been drawn to her like magnets, watching and stroking and checking and admiring.

I've been knitting a few rounds of Jazzy's rainbow dress here and there.

And taking lots of pics of it too.

We have been doing the farm chores and picking raspberries, strawberries, currants and gooseberries.

We have been making cubby houses and sand tea parties and we have been drawing, colouring in, dressing up and stirring yet another frothy pot of strawberry jam.

Friday, December 24, 2010

Since taking off her school uniform a week ago, Miss Jazzy has been wearing a frou-frou, tulle covered princess dress every day. The same dress day in and day out. She loves it. Its been the uniform she wears when she's not wearing her uniform.

But last night at a farmers' market in Melbourne, the princess dress suffered some major rips and tears and this morning she stayed dressed in her dressing gown and the dress lay in a heap where she left it last night.

This morning I began the important task of making her a dress she would love just as much but would perhaps be a bit sturdier for the life of a princess who lives on a farm.

I had strict instructions of course: It has to twirl and whirl and be great for dancing she said. It has to tie up at the back with a sash and be long enough to be girly but short enough not to get in the way and it has to be colourful.

I'm sure she meant pinks and purples but denim with red is my favourite colour combination right now and she doesn't seem to mind at all.

So far, so good but the real test will come tomorrow morning.

And so dear readers, we here at Foxs Lane would like to take this opportunity to wish you and your families a wonderful, merry, love filled weekend whether it be Christmas or any other day of the week for you.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

I'm good. I'm enjoying the first slow day of the summer holidays. We've got nowhere to go and no schedule to keep. So far the only thing reminding me that time is passing is the requests for more toast and more toast.

Indi and Jazzy are doing illustrating lessons on the computer, Pepper, Bren, Pierre, Liam and his kids are in the shed processing garlic and I am sorting photos and stirring my strawberry jam pot.

You guys were so wonderful and helpful with the title question I asked you the other day, so I thought you might help me with something else.

How do you deal with other people's kids when they misbehave on your watch????

The other day I took a whole lot of kids to the playground. They played for a while and then they noticed a young guy cleaning up the place. He was collecting rubbish and tidying up. They kept playing and watching him and giggling and I kept knitting. All of a sudden they erupted into laughter. I looked up to see one of the girls tipping a bag of our lunch rubbish all over the ground. There were food scraps and tinsel and bits of wrapping paper and confetti and glitter that we'd been careful to collect. It was a real mess.

I was horrified. I apologised to the man and asked him if he could get the girls to help him clean it up. He said no and that he'd seen worse and that it was his job and that he'd do it.

I turned to the girl who had done it and had no idea how to deal with her. She is not my kid. I gave her a bag and told her to get the big bits. I told her she had behaved badly and wrongly and disrespectfully. I told her that one day it might be her cleaning for her job and how would she feel if someone did that to her. I probably went on about it too long and then when I got them in the car to take them home I went on about it some more. To be honest I had no idea what to say or do though and I'm pretty sure that I made no impact on her.

So how do you discipline other people's kids? Is it my responsibility to teach them right from wrong? What would you do in that situation?

The photos are of the Rainbow Eden's Eve I am knitting. Oh how I love this wool. I wanna eat it. I am staying up waaaaaaaaaay too late watching each colour blend into the next. Love!

Oh and for those who asked, I bought the wool off a woman who was having a destash, she had bought it off a destash a while back and I have no idea where it came from before that.

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Yesterday I took Miss Jazzy and two of her seven year old friends to Ballarat for the day. We played at a playground, we ate yummy snacks and we saw a movie.

They chatted and sang and danced the whole day through.

At one stage I overheard them discussing their Mums and what they do.

'My Mum is a lawyer in Ballarat' said one proudly.

'My Mum is a journalist for the Ballarat newspaper' said the other, just as sure of herself.

And then they turned to my Jazzy, 'What about your Mum? What does she do?'

'Ummmmm....I'm not sure' replied my girl.

I looked at her wearing a t'shirt I'd screen printed and a skirt I'd sewn, dying to hear her reply. 'Well, she washes the dishes sometimes and she sleeps and ummmm she does the laundry and she helps Dad get the eggs.'

Wowzers, talk about a quick crash down to earth.

Who on earth am I and what do I do?

This morning I reminded her of that conversation and asked her what her Dad does. 'He's a farmer, he looks after the animals and gets the eggs and plants vegetables.' she quickly replied.

I'm fascinated that some people get cool sounding titles to be proud of, whereas others, like me, don't. Somehow housewife and stay at home Mother don't sound like words I'd use to describe myself anyway. They include some but certainly not all of what I do. And I studied fine art with a Bachelor of Education at uni but that's not me any more.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not feeling bad about what I do, I was the one at the movies on a Friday morning and not in an office after all.

Meanwhile, this afternoon, Bren is making a little dog house on the deck for Willow and her puppies, Pepper is passing him tools, Jazzy is playing Monopoly with a friend of mine and Indi is in Melbourne with her cousins.

So who are you and what do you get called?

I wonder.

I hope you are having a great weekend whoever you are.

See ya. XX

Oh and one last thing: what's your favourite thing to do with too many strawberries?

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Wowzers, what a crazy time of the year! So many lists, so much to remember and so much to do. And of course with that comes so many things to hold on to, so many things to cherish and so many things making me smile.

Here are a couple of things making me smile today:

Casting off The Acacia pattern (above), trying it on Miss Pepper and her wearing it constantly ever since. I still haven't darned in the ends or blocked it. Raveled here.

Being invited into Jazzy's class to help them make and then outfit some teddy bears. I thought the teacher wanted me there to teach the kids how to do it all, when in fact she wanted to let them loose with the piles of materials. You should have seen the magnificent creations they came up with.

The star shaped garden kitchen garden beds outside the front door waiting to be filled and then planted out. No more driving down to the paddocks for a lettuce, hooray.

Watching the boys work out the exact angles of each garden bed using an iPhone app.

A woman coming up to me in the super market last night telling me I was pushing her shopping in her trolley. Looking over and seeing Bren and the girls with our trolley hysterically laughing at me.

Berries and Willow's pregnant belly and knitting commissions and sneaky tours of the new school classrooms and blue skies and salads and plans and coffee....................................................

Friday, December 10, 2010

I've just been cruising around blog land visiting the happy spaces of Ms Cathie and Ms Becky and reading their happy lists. Isn't it funny how someone else's list of happiness can make you feel happy.

Well it got me thinking, if my happy list got me thinking about all the good things in my life right now and reading those two happy lists made me feel happy all over again, then I think you should totally have a go and write your own list. What a great start to the weekend.

Happy, happy, happy!

Don't think about it too much. Just start writing and see how you go.Then leave your linky in the space below and we can all pop over to your space, read your happy list and spread that love.

Thursday, December 9, 2010

The crazy rains of the past few weeks have made such a mess of our farm and our plans for this season. At the moment it looks like we might not be able to plant a vegie crop this year, our orchards that a week ago were laden with gorgeous looking fruit, have been horribly mutilated by the warm wet, fungal loving tropical conditions and garlic beds that should be drying out and feeling the warmth of summer are instead sitting in water. Our driveway and various other farm structures have been washed down the creek and just when we thought we'd had it all, the locusts have been flying in this morning and making them selves at home.

I feel guilty for feeling bad though. There are so many out there so worse off than me. So many that make my list seem insignificant.

So I'm not going to give into it today.

Instead I'm going to write my happy list. No order. Just a ramble of things as they come to me.

If this is something you feel like doing too, let me know so I can come and visit.

Monday, December 6, 2010

Lately I feel like I've been having the same conversation over and over with so many of my friends. Is this it for the next ten to twenty years? Is this what we have to look forward to? Is cooking, washing, working, cleaning, driving and planning enough?

I don't know if it's the weather, the time of year or our age group but its coming up all the time.

But then out of nowhere last night I had a sort of vision of the bigger picture.

We had had an enormous day driving to Melbourne and back for a farmers' market and then an evening of dealing with tired and cranky kids and the last thing I felt like doing was the farm chores. But as we were walking back from shutting the ducks in I had this thought that if I could show my life to myself 10 or 15 or 20 years ago, how excited those Kates would be for the future.

It was twilight, magic hour as Bren calls it, and I started to tell those Kates how my farmer boy and I had just wandered through the forest to feed and close the ducks in for the night, how we were walking past the 300 chicklets and checking on pregnant Willow dog. How our three daughters were fast asleep in their beds and we were going inside to watch a dvd, have a cuppa and I would knit.

Somehow it changed my perspective by breaking it down like that. The tantrums, the mess and the lack of clean clothes or food for the school lunches seemed insignificant somehow and it made it sound like a wonderful dream. Like something to look forward to.

I guess I am living my dream, my happily ever after. I just have to remember this when I get bogged down in the details.

Have you been having these thoughts/conversations? I wonder if you are living your dream. If when you break it down that you can see beyond the daily chores and it looks different. I'd love to know.

I hope your Monday is a funday. XX

ps And the little hints of denim coloured knitting from the last few posts became the top of this dress. The bottom is a seer sucker table cloth. More details here.